Friday, August 18, 2017

Whether our president should have been stronger in
condemning the racism displayed by hate groups this week in Charlottesville, it
is clearly condemned by the media, politicians and religious groups all across
America. And rightly so. Racism is unjust, ungodly and totally based on
ignorance. Racism is rejected, even in the deep south, by all people of good will.
We will not condone it and we teach our children to condemn it as well. Unless…

Unless it is practiced by Israel.

In Israel, racism is protected by law. None of its shameful
policies is denied or hidden under the rug. Jews are declared to be superior
human beings, and are given preferential treatment in commerce, education and
health care. Most of all, Jews are
treated with dignity.

On the other hand, those who are not Jews are declared a
“demographic threat.” In spite of
750,000 Palestinians driven by force from their homes in 1948, and millions
more displaced in 1967, in Israel’s mind, there are still too many. How can Israel be a Jewish State with
Palestinians around to remind it of how it got to be such. Thus, Palestinians in Israel are confined to
assigned areas. Those in the West Bank are hidden out of sight by an apartheid
wall, and those in Gaza are imprisoned in the
world’s largest open air prison.

Marc Ellis, Jewish scholar and activist for justice,
reflecting on the riots in Charlottesville over the monument to Robert E.
Lee, writes:

I think of Yad Vashem, the
Holocaust memorial in Israel as among other things, a monument. At Yad Vashem,
the dark chapter of Jewish life is highlighted, as it should be. But part of
that chapter of Jewish life after the Holocaust, the Nakba, is omitted.[1]

Why does the US media and government declare racism evil in
Charlottesville and support it in Israel? If there is a difference in Steve Bannon and
Benjamin Netanyahu, I can’t see it.

That image of smothering Palestine caught my imagination. I
picture some poor victim being pushed to the floor, thrashing about, feet and
hands clawing in the air doing any and everything in his power to push away the
pillow so he can breathe.

Now, make the pillow
invisible and all the thrashing around looks unreasonable and out of
control. Is that not exactly what our US media and politicians have done. They
freely talk about the unreasonable Palestinians who simply want to deny
Israel’s right to exist. Make the pillow
invisible and every reaction from rocks to rockets looks like the acts of mad
men. Nobody is in control. Nobody wants peace.

In reality:

In January 2004,
Sheikh Yassin said he was willing to end armed resistance against Israel if a
Palestinian state was created in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem. Hamas
leader Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi also said that Palestinians would declare long hudna in exchange for independence.

On March 22, Israel assassinated Sheikh Yassin, On April 17, they killed al-Rantissi.[ii] To this day, most of Palestine’s leaders have either
been killed or are sitting in Israeli prisons.
But if Palestine does not resist, it will totally suffocate under the
Israeli pillow. And its reaction to Israel’s theft of its land and water, the continued enlargement of Israel’s apartheid
wall, road blocks, check points, illegal imprisonment of Palestinians,
including children, the cutting off of electricity, and regular bombardment of
Gaza will go unnoticed.

And as long as the good citizens of the US refuse to see the
pillow and allow Israel to dictate our conscience, little will change. The pain
of the pillow will press down harder and harder.

Friday, August 4, 2017

What a great idea. Don’t blame Israel for its cruelty to the
Palestinians, blame God.

In 1937, David Ben-Gurion waved a copy of the Bible at the
members of the Royal Peel Commission, shouting, “This is our land registry
proof, our right to Palestine does not come from the Mandate Charter, the Bible
is our Mandate Charter.”[1]

That leaves us with the question; Whose Bible? Well, it was the Jewish Bible in
which the Jewish God, spoke in a language understood only by Jews that declared
enormous favor to the Jews above all their fellow human beings. It does cause one
to wonder.

Yet, according to a 2013 Pew Research poll:

Forty-four percent of the U.S.
general public replied “yes” to the question, “Was Israel given to the Jewish
people by God?”[2]

When you consider that about one in five Americans claim to
not even believe in God, these numbers are quite amazing. So, with American
support and approval, Israel builds settlements, puts those who resist the
occupation, including children, in prison, restricts travel, erects road
blocks, cuts off electricity and constructs a separation wall blocking farmers
from their fields, doctors from their hospitals and children from their
schools... all in the name of God.

And that is just in the West Bank. Gaza fares even worse.
Because “God wants Israel to have all that land purged of Palestinians”, Gaza
has been barricaded from the rest of the world, mercilessly bombarded time and
time again. The U.N. has warned that
because of the lack of food, water and medical care, Gaza will be uninhabitable
in about three more years. According to Israel, what does the U.N. have to do
with anything? God wants it this way.

However, to come to this conclusion, Israel has to distort
its own biblical claims by omitting the “conditions” upon which such a divine
donation was made. Such as, the Jews, “shall be just and compassionate, and
they shall not oppress the orphan, widow, alien and the poor. (Zechariah
7:9-11). At best, Israel’s claim of God’s endorsement is based on half-truths
and over simplification. Again, Washington Report points out:

In order to gain membership in the
United Nations, Israel promised that it would allow refugees it created in 1948
to return to their homes. Instead it demolished more than 400 Palestinian villages
and killed those who attempted to return.

To this day, Israel has never declared its borders nor
established a constitution. Its “democracy, for Jews only” is declared through
the barrel of a gun, and it’s all done for God. How convenient.

Thomas L. Are

I preached for forty three years in the Presbyterian Church before retiring. If anyone would ever refer to me as a Liberation Theologian, I would be pleased. I started blogging several years ago to express my political and religious concern for justice, especially justice for the Palestinians.